


The Irony of Grief

by SerendipitousLyss



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Soen no Kiseki/Akatsuki no Megami | Fire Emblem Path of Radiance/Radiant Dawn
Genre: Angst, Bittersweet Ending, Character Death, Death, Father-Son Relationship, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, Insomnia, M/M, Minor Character Death, idk if greil counts as a minor character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-04
Updated: 2021-02-04
Packaged: 2021-03-15 16:55:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29192658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SerendipitousLyss/pseuds/SerendipitousLyss
Summary: After Greil's death, Titania asks Soren to check on Ike and make sure he's okay. Soren's not the best at this sort of thing, but if it's for Ike, he's willing to give it a try.
Relationships: Ike/Senerio | Soren
Comments: 4
Kudos: 31





	The Irony of Grief

**Author's Note:**

> Been a while since I worked on anything not zine-related, so have some Ike/Soren angst for a change of pace. I started this fic back in mid December while on a flight to see my parents and only just got around to finishing it. This is very lightly edited so apologies for spelling and grammar errors. Enjoy!

“Soren.”

Blinking, Soren lifts his head as the call of his name jolts him out of his thoughts. He’d been sitting at a long table and staring out the window, so lost in thought that he hadn't even noticed Titania approaching him. He straightens up in his seat, turning to look into the face of his fellow mercenary. “What is it?” he asks, lifting an eyebrow in silent curiosity.

Titania cracks a tiny smile, setting a folder down on the table in front of him. “It’s not like you to space out like that,” she comments, the barest hint of a teasing tone breaking through her typically serious facade. “Anyway, I was hoping you’d take these to Ike. They’re inventory reports.”

Soren flips open the folder and skims through it briefly. He’d forgotten that he’d asked Titania to take inventory of their stock. “Sure,” he replies clippedly, closing the folder and tucking it under his arm. He pushes himself up from his seat, pausing briefly to stretch. “Anything unusual?”

“Nothing out of the ordinary,” Titania confirms. She makes a move to leave them room, then hesitates. “Soren?”

Soren frowns. “Yeah?”

“Check up on Ike for me while you’re there, okay?” Titania requests softly. “I’m… worried about him.”

Soren’s expression softens minutely, and he swallows back a lump that forms in his throat. “I’ll try,” he responds, and doesn’t bring up the fact that he, too, is concerned over the state of their new leader.

Even since the death of Commander Greil, Ike had been… distant. Outwardly, he keeps up appearances, throwing himself into his work with even more vigor than before, but Soren can’t help but notice the little differences in his behavior that belie a deeper turmoil. He briefly wonders if Ike has even taken the time to grieve properly, and immediately decides that he can’t have; they’ve hardly slowed down at all between the change in leadership and their march toward Gallia, and in all the times Soren has seen him, he’s been completely engrossed in his work. These days, it’s extremely rare to see Ike anywhere but his room or the training grounds, ferociously hacking away at the straw dummies left behind by whatever army had previously occupied the empty fort. He doesn’t even join them for meals much anymore; Mist has taken to bringing him food in his makeshift office while he works.

Soren would be fooling himself to say he hasn't noticed.

Despite knowing this, however, he’s at a loss. This is the first and most impactful death the mercenaries have experienced since Soren had joined them all those years ago, and he has no idea how to navigate this tense new atmosphere. He would definitely consider himself to be one of, if not the, least comforting presences of all the group. He has no clue what he’d even say to Ike, much less do to make him feel better, but if Titania is asking him, he figures she must have some faith in him, at least.

“Thank you,” Titania says, offering Soren up a small, tired smile as she heads toward the fort’s entrance.

Soren lets out a long breath, idly rubbing his thumb along the folder’s smooth surface, and turns resolutely in the direction of Ike’s room.

His door is closed, predictably. He’d never used to keep his door closed before, but more often than not, now, he seems to want to ward off anyone seeking to visit him. Soren raises his hand to rap on the door with his knuckles, hesitating for just a moment. Would Ike even want to see him, especially since it’s technically on work-related business? He’s overwhelmed enough as is, but, well, Soren’s never been one to go easy on anyone else. Not to mention, he really does need to deliver Titania’s report. Letting out a breathy sigh, he finally knocks, the noise echoing slightly in the empty stone halls.

After a moment, he hears Ike’s muffled voice from behind the door. “Come in,” it calls, so Soren obliges, turning the squeaky brass knob and pushing open the neglected wooden door.

As he crosses the room’s threshold, he sees Ike sitting at an old-looking table across the room - an old desk he’d cleared to make room for his work, perhaps - and meet’s his friend’s tired gaze. Ike has shadows forming under his eyes, and it’s oddly the first thing Soren notices. They make him look older, more like his father, and not in a particularly good way. The spark of energy he’d always brought with him is absent, hiding under layers of fatigue and undoubtedly smothered by the weight of his thoughts. Still, despite all of this, he musters up a smile for Soren’s sake. “Hey, come on in,” he says.

Soren guesses that Ike means it to be reassuring, but the flatness of his smile has an opposite effect on him. Seeing his expression so devoid of life only makes him worry more. He swallows thickly and crosses Ike’s empty floor in a few short steps.

Everything about this place feels wrong. Unlike Ike’s bedroom at the mercenary hideout, which had been filled wall to wall with trinkets from towns he’d visited on his travels and souveniers from his father’s missions, this room is large and empty and cold. The shelves are all bare, dust and cobwebs taking the place of all the memories he’d had to leave behind. No one had bothered to clean then, since this abandoned fort served only as a temporary living space for the few days it would take to arrange their meeting with the Gallian king.

“Soren?” Ike calls out to him, breaking his chain of spiraling thoughts.

His gaze snaps back to Ike, and he blinks once, twice, then banishes the unusually sentimental thoughts from his mind. “Sorry,” he says quickly, tugging the folder out from under his arm and averting Ike’s gaze. As he’d suspected, it’s quite hard for him to bring up such heavy topics, especially with Ike. “Titania asked me to drop this off with you. It’s a inventory of our weapon stock, along with a list of replacements we’ll need to pick up the next time we come across a decent armory.”

Ike accepts the folder as Soren holds it out to him, setting it on his desk atop a pile of packets that Soren can only assume are other similar reports. “Thanks,” he sighs. The bruises under his eyes look darker than ever.

“You look tired,” Soren comments before he can really think against it. “Have you been getting enough sleep?”

Ike turns to Soren with surprise, eyebrows raising as he meet’s his gaze once more. There’s a moment of stunned silence between the both of them before Ike replies, “I’m okay, really.”

Soren’s frown deepens. “That isn’t what I asked,” he says bluntly. Unlike Mist or Titania, he prefers not to beat around the bush or filter his words for someone else’s sake. Perhaps that’s why he’d been saddled with this job in the first place.

Ike visibly recoils. It’s slight, but Soren’s sharp eyes catch the way he stiffens slightly in his seat, his hand firmly gripping the edge of his desk. “I’m…” he starts, but the words seem to wither and die on his tongue before he can voice them. He tears his gaze from Soren’s. “We’re all still adjusting. Mist hasn’t been sleeping well either. I’m sorry if I’m falling behind on the work that needs to be done.”

There’s audible bitterness in Ike’s words, hiding beneath the uncharacteristic stiffness of his tone. It hadn’t been Soren’s intention to insinuate that they’ve fallen behind. No one had expected Ike to keep pace with Greil, especially not right away, and he feels a twinge of guilt at having put that thought into Ike’s head. “I’m not worried about the company,” he says, voice softening somewhat in an attempt to set aside thoughts of business. “I’m worried about you.”

Ike grimaces slightly, but does not respond.

The silence between them lingers for a few seconds, long enough that Soren starts to feel fidgety in response to tension in the room. “You should rest, Ike,” he tries again. “A lot has happened, I know. We’re all dealing with it, but we can’t do anything if our leader becomes a sleep-deprived, braindead zombie in the meantime.”

Contrary to its intended effect, Ike looks annoyed at Soren’s accusation. “It’s not the same, Soren! I just watched my father die, the only parent I had left. You don’t know what it’s like, it’s not as easy as you make it out to be!”

Soren winces. This is the reason he’d been so reluctant to follow Titania’s suggestion. He doesn’t have the words to know what will make Ike feel better, and his frustration hurts Soren more than he’d ever care to admit. “I’m sorry, you’re right,” he backpedals, “but my suggestion still stands. It’s not good for you to push yourself like this. You’ll burn yourself out.”

Ike glances down guiltily. “I’m sorry too. I shouldn’t have yelled like that. Maybe I  _ should _ rest.” He tips his head into the palm of his head.

Soren thinks for a moment of retreating, of leaving Ike to his own devices and hoping his friend will get the rest he needs, but something keeps him from leaving. Instead, he steps over to the bed and sits himself on the edge of it, facing Ike. “You know,” he starts after a moment of silence, choosing his words carefully, “I never knew my father.”

This causes Ike to raise his head, meeting Soren’s gaze once more. His anger and guilt is gone now, replaced by shock and a hint of curiosity. “Never?”

Soren shrugs his shoulders. “At least, not since I was very young. I don’t remember him at all. In that way, I guess you can say that I don’t know what it’s like to have a father.” He pauses, swallowing. It’s a vulnerable feeling, putting these memories into words. It feels a bit like a personal failure that there’s something he doesn’t know, but these kinds of experiences cannot be replaced with books. “My magic teacher didn’t treat me like his child, even though he technically raised me. I was a means to uphold his legacy, and nothing more. He did the bare minimum to make sure I stayed alive and healthy, but that was all.”

Ike stares at him, dumbfounded. “Why are you telling me this?” he asks quietly.

“Because I trust you,” Soren says immediately, “and because I want you to understand something that’s… difficult for me to put into words.”

Almost immediately, he feels the urge to retreat from this conversation, to wave Ike off and pretend like this embarrassingly personal moment hadn’t begun, but it’s too late for him to back down now. “I don’t have anything to compare him to, but I think… maybe I know a little about what it’s like to have a father after all. Commander Greil was kind to me. He accepted me, a penniless child with no past to speak of, into his ranks with hardly a second thought.” He clasps his hands together, fingers threading between each other in a nervous gesture. “He presented me with unique opportunities and encouraged me to grow outside of my comfort zone. I can’t be sure, but I think that Greil was a little bit of a father to me, too. That’s the impression I feel, at least.” He pauses for a moment, staring down at his clasped hand, and hesitates. It feels like he’s wading into dangerous waters, unsure if the current is safe or if it will drag him out to sea, but the thought won’t leave him now that it’s there. “I know I can’t empathize what you and Mist are going through right now, but I just… wanted you to know that I understand. If nothing else, then at least a little bit. I’ll never love him like you do, but I miss him.”

A drop of water splashes onto Soren’s wrist, and with a start he realizes that he’s crying. He blinks, and another drop falls in response. He stares down at the drops wordlessly. When was the last time he’d cried like this, let alone in front of another person, someone he considers a friend? Try as he might, he can’t remember.

Ike, on the other hand, is dry-eyed, but Soren knows it isn’t for lack of feeling. “Soren…” he starts, then falls quiet again, biting his lip.

Soren looks down in an attempt to hide his face from Ike, despite how futile he knows the action to be. He reaches up to rub away the traitorous tears, inexplicably angry with himself for getting emotional over Ike’s father when Ike himself can’t.

There’s a shuffling of fabric by his ear as Ike moves, but Soren can only see his feet closing the distance between them. In the next moment, Ike drops down to his knees and reaches for Soren’s shoulders. He only gets a brief glimpse at Ike’s sorrowful expression before he pulls Soren into an embrace, tucking his head into his shoulder. “Just let me know if it’s not okay,” he mumbles, but his quiet voice sounds loud in such close proximity. Then, even quieter, “I miss him, too.”

Soren’s first urge is to push Ike away, because it’s his first urge whenever anyone tries to take hold of him, but this is different. He still feels the tingle of unease beneath his skin, urging him to separate himself for his own safety, but he can also sense that this is meant to be as much for Soren’s own benefit as it is for Ike’s. A form of mutual comfort he’d never experienced before joining the Mercenaries. Ike can’t cry for his father, but he can offer this as a form of support, and in doing so support himself as well. Soren almost laughs at the thought; even when it’s about him, Ike manages to find a way to take others into account. Wordlessly, he raises his own arms and returns the embrace, willing his instincts to take a back seat just this once. He doesn’t cry more than a few tears, never the kind of man to openly weep over something as common as a mercenary’s death, but he doesn’t back away even after his eyes have dried.

He doesn’t know if his words helped or hurt, if it Ike is any better or worse for them, but when he comes out of his room that evening to join the rest of the group for dinner, he catches Titania’s gaze from across the table as she flashes him a grateful smile. In the end, he supposes, it was worth it.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! If you have questions or prompts for me, you can find me @serenlyss on twitter or @serendipitouslyss on tumblr.


End file.
